Just hit me that the 3% damage increase from Crusade only applies to demons, undeads, humanoids and elementals. As most Ulduar bosses will probably be giants, should we expect an extra 3% lost dps from here too?

So to recap our DPS losses as it stands now:

- minus 3% from Crusade;
- minus ~5% from Righteous Vengeance and Fanaticism;
- minus 1% from Holy Wrath;
- minus 1% from Glyph of Sense Undead

Total: ~10% less DPS than we are doing now in Naxxramas.

Guess we will have to wait and hope they are aware of all this and will offer us compensation elsewhere, especially that now Retribution has plenty of talent points to spare.

Don't forget the 1% damage from the sense undead minor glyph!

Notice the change to 3% damage and 6% healing bonus to any aura. In theory a ret can get 3% haste, 3% damage and +6% healing from retri aura if he specs 18 pts into prot.

Er, no. Your unbuffed Intellect is 110. 5/5 Divine Intellect will increase that by 16, for a whopping 240 mana before raid buffs.

# Fanaticism reduced to 3 ranks for 6/12/18% bonus and 10/20/30% threat reduction.
# Righteous Vengeance reduced to 3 ranks for 10/20/30%.

Slimming down talents is nice and I'm ok with balancing damage, however as others have said it feels a bit weird considering what was communicated to us has been the complete opposite (your damage is fine in Naxx, we want you to do the same on non-undead).

Further, I'm not sure what they're trying to achieve here with these changes specifically. These changes most heavily target Judgement damage which will result in a statistical reduction in Judgement damage overall, but in no way a reduction to Judgement burst. Judgements are still going to hit like a truck.

Why are they pulling 10 levers seemingly in opposite directions?


# Auras will now persist through death.

Comfort improvements are always welcome, but while we're at it why not for Seals? Too radical? I don't see why they can't move us closer to the DK (presence/aura) model with Seals becoming Presences. Flavor is a weak argument if it's the "only" explanation for annoying mechanics and has no logic to support it.


# Improved Retribution Aura has been removed from the game.
# Improved Retribution Aura's effect has been merged into Sanctified Retribution (Tier 5).

Again while I like slimming down talents, I hate inconsistencies.

Combining Ret Aura + Sanctified Retribution: Good.
Leaving Swift Retribution as a floater on its own: Bad.

Why does 3% more raid damage (and some silly thorns damage) cost 1 talent point, while 3% raid haste (which is definitely weaker for all damage dealing classes) cost 3 talent points? Fine it works for healing classes, but that's still a very big discrepancy. Doesn't that go against their usual logic about talent point worth? (You know that logic that caused them to change Vengeance up and down half a dozen times).

A combined talent for 3 points to increase raid damage and haste by 1% per talent point (and the silly thorns damage) would make a lot more sense if they want to maintain consistency.


This is a nice way of making things more streamlined, it definitely helps against being forced to stick to one aura to gain the benefits of some talent (using devo or a resistance aura in arenas just got more viable), but again it breaks down with inconsistencies such as Swift Retribution, which seem to be Ret Aura only.

That is to say if auras were actually more useful than the "meh" buffs they are at the moment. I'm hoping some day we'll get an overhaul/some consolidation of the whole aura system.




Compared to current itemization the boots are on par with all the other plate boots (pretty much most of the current plate boots are the same +/- 5 DPS), while the belt is the new "Best in Slot".

However, based on the armor value I'd estimate they're 226 itemlevel, which is the same as KT-25/Malygos-25 drops and I'm assuming regular Ulduar drops will be higher, so I doubt they'll be BiS compared to Ulduar drops.


This could be a concern, you're correct. 4% less on giants will be noticeable (remember it's all multiplicative) especially if the whole instance turns to be Giant type (likely). Personally I think they should get rid of such flavor distinctions, they serve no purpose/fun and just frustrate people.



We can write this up as a new mandatory Glyph, which means we're locked into always using Judgement, Consecration and this new Glyph. They should replace the Sense Undead minor glyph with this one as a minor and adjust abilities accordingly.

Feels sort of silly when you remember the original purpose of Glyphs was to provide flavor, now they're just cumbersome when respeccing (yea I have 5 specs not 2, if you count pvp).


Overall I'd say what we know so far is not necessarily bad, but it's riddled with inconsistencies and outdated mechanics where they're moving somewhat in the right direction, but stopping short of going the whole way and actually rectifying them.

Some more comments:

-Blessing of Sanctuary: I was hoping to see this one go, especially considering posts here and there about making some of the effects of BoSanc passive for some classes. It would go a long way into making blessing management more comfortable ("oh we got a prot paladin, wait let me re-arrange all the blessings and sort half a dozen 10 min blessings").

-Tons of free points: I'm assuming more is yet to come, but if it doesn't it means we'll have quite a few useless points after taking everything from Ret.
One good thing if they keep it this way: I can have "one" Ret spec instead of Ret PvE and Ret PvP and use my dual spec thingamajig to take Holy or Prot.


# Abolish Poison: Now ticks every 3 sec, up from every 2. Now lasts 12 sec., up from 8.
# Poison Cleansing Totem and Disease Cleansing Totem have been merged into "Cleansing Totem." Cleansing Totem pulses every 3 sec, down from 5.
# Abolish Disease: Now cleanses a disease every 3 sec, down from 5. Duration reduced from 20 seconds, down to 12 sec.

What about Cleanse? You know that one spell that has become almost useless. Many times I find continuing to do what I'm doing is more worthwhile then spending 10 GCDs doing nothing at all but trying to cleanse a cleanse resistant debuff/quickly stacking debuff. Cleansing against frost mages is futile.

It feels almost absurd that they're giving so much attention to these spells, while they leave the most broken of them unchanged. Hopeless case?

*New Talent* Decimation, Tier 8, 2 point talent - When you Shadowbolt or Incinerate a target that is at or below 35% health, the cast time of your next Soulfire is reduced by 30/60%. Lasts 10 sec.

Again, inconsistencies are ugly. Why is it ok for this to be activated at 35% where as HoW was changed to 20%?


Disclaimer: All the above are initial impressions/ideas to fuel discussion and I'm very well aware that a large chunk of information is missing/yet to come. Lets hope it meets some of the expectations above

Close but no cigar, an all round spec would be 1 point short, making you choose between 2/2 Imp HoJ and 3/3 Swift Retribution, even though the choice is obvious for arena, raids won't be happy losing 1% haste so you can save some gold on respecs.

New Kirin Tor rings:


(World of Raids: Costs the original Dalaran port ring and 1000 gold.)

Neither is going to be best in slot, however they are still pretty good and worth considering if you don't have Surge Needle yet.

A ring ranking would look like this (DPS numbers are based on Naxx-25 gear that is not hit/exp capped, using current mechanics):

[Surge Needle Ring]: 192
[Ruthlessness]: 185
*New* Inscribed Ring of the Kirin Tor: 172
[Greatring of Collision] (@16 STR): 171
*New* Inscribed Band of the Kirin Tor: 169
[Circle of Death]: 168

and for comparison

[Ring of the Kirin Tor]: 152


Full PvE + Imp HoJ and some PvP perks from Prot: http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?pala...0&version=9614

Or alternatively you can skip Imp HoJ and get all the PvP perks in Ret. Mind you, neither solution is optimal for PvP, but at least it's something.

(Gimping PvE spec is not even worth mentioning here).

While I agree they probably won't be BIS compared to Ulduar, I'd be surprised if Ulduar was ilvl226/239 (with the obligatory shift up to 239/252 for the end boss). We've been told by a blue that Retri damage against undead now is where they want it to be against non-UD mobs in Ulduar. With the Judgement reductions applying equally to all mobs, that implies only around a 5% power creep between T7 and T8. Along with Ulduar-10 badges being Naxx-25 badges, this is consistent with the idea that Ulduar loot levels will be 213 for 10-man and 226 for 25s.

I'm all for slimming down trees with bloat, but they seriously took it a bit too far with Ret. We now have 14 talent points free after picking up every DPS talent possible. We can pick up every single PvE DPS talent and most of the PvP talents in one build.

It looks like they aren't finished with the tree (unless they enjoy low prot looking like a mangled shitheap), so hopefully its something they're paying attention to.

This is the spec I will probably end up choosing once my character gets copied over to the PTR:
http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?pala...5&version=9614

I can see Divine Intellect being pretty nice if the current plans for SA continue.

I just don't get the idea behind the paladin changes. While they do like the current state of retribution, they do nerf it on the other hand (directly, like with fanaticism and RV - or indirectly, by not revamping some clearly outdated mechanics like the Sense UD-Glyph or type-based crusade). While they do not seem to like the holy paladin's representation and playstile in arenas, they buff the hybrid spec even more.

Moving DP to Tier 6 is an insignificant, even worthless change - you can pick it up as easily as before. If you add the holy tree buffs (blessed hands, pure of heart, imp conc aura effect on every aura), holies will be even stronger, especially in 2's. While I do like these buffs, Blizzard just doesn't seem to know where they want to go with 3.1.

* Glyph of Exorcism -- Increases damage done by Exorcism by 20%. (Old: Your Exorcism also interrupts spellcasting for 2 sec.)
* Glyph of Divine Storm *new* -- Your Divine Storm now heals for an additional 15% of the damage it causes.
* Glyph of Divine Plea *new* -- While Divine Plea is active, you take 3% reduced damage from all sources.
* Glyph of Hand of Salvation *new* -- When you cast Hand of Salvation on yourself, it also reduces damage taken by 20%.

Well we now have 2 absolutely required Glyphs (Judgement and Exorcism). Some of these could be interesting, but I doubt any will break the stranglehold that Consecration has on our mana consumption.

Was looking at the new "uncategorised" spells and found this:-

Arm of Law - Thottbot: World of Warcraft

Could this be a new prot / ret-pvp mechanic for dealing with casters

Also found this meh divine storm glyph

Glyph of Divine Storm - Thottbot: World of Warcraft

I didn't see this posted:

Glyph of Lay on Hands (Minor) was also changed to reduce Lay on Hands cooldown by 5 minutes, instead of increasing mana return by 20%.


Which makes it useless for the purpose we were using it (I guess that's good) and would constitute another mana nerf. At this point, are there ANY minor glyphs that we like for Ulduar? If not, I guess they achieved making them flavor.

This is ridiculous. While other classes will get another 5 seconds to berserk or some useful cooldown tuning, the main purpose of paladin glyphs seem to be damage reduction and healing utility, even concerning DPS abilities.

Is it so difficult to give us some choices - some diversity - dps-wise?

The description of that spell is almost identical to Death Grip which would point to yes, though I just can't see them completely ripping off such a signature move (it has happened before however). Confusing.


I guess you're right with that being their reasoning, though I don't think it's a particularly good way of justifying things.

Regarding the spec, as I said, it's not a perfect solution, but if the only thing you're missing for PvP is vindication, it could be viable. Anyway, I doubt any of this matters as I'm sure they're still shuffling things around/might add more abilities as you suggest.


I'm not sure what to make of this one. For tanks who would like damage reduction abilities, it's pretty worthless due to the salvation part. For anyone else (DPS), you almost always use HoS before you overtake the tank on aggro otherwise you deserve to die and it's not like getting hit by a raidboss for 32k in a few hits will be any less lethal than 40k.

The only "in" for this Glyph would be PvP use, assuming it's a minor Glyph (would you really drop Judg/Exo/HoJ if it was a major? Doubt it).

The other Glyphs, heh, nice more Glyphs that will never ever be used.

Isn't 1200dmg for an npc ability a little low though and also at the same time a little high for a player "charge" or "death grip". The range may not have been update correctly however.

My line of thought regarding HoS was something like:
1) Oh sweet a targeted min-Pain Suppression!
2) Wait, its just for me, well another defensive CD when I'm prot!
3) Oh, its on Hand of Salv, ew.

There are a few more that I neglected to post because they had little to do with PvE ret. However:
# Glyph of Lay on Hands -- Reduces the cooldown of your Lay on Hands spell by 5 min.(Old: Your Lay on Hands also grants you as much mana as it grants your target.)

Not only is it a minor glyph, but that cooldown would allow LoH to be used in arenas. If that goes through it would be a pretty sick buff to paladins across the board.

On another tangent, given how weak Exorcism is as an attack would you really want to glyph it in PvP?

Arm of Law could be something that the Iron Council uses. Blackrock Depths had the Ring of Law, so possible correlation there.

Glyphed LoH would be 15 minutes, specced 11 - cannot be used in arenas then, or am I mistaken?

edit: This one is pretty sick:
* Glyph of Holy Shock *new* -- Reduces the cooldown of Holy Shock by 1 sec

5 second HS is huge. Another buff for holy!

15 minutes is the cutoff for Arenas. See Fel Domination - Spell - World of Warcraft

Does the arena cutoff consider the base cooldown or the modified one though?